of her tea. Finally I look at her. “What you so quiet for? I know you got a opinion bout all this.”
“You gone accuse me a philosophizing.”
“Go ahead,” I say. “I ain’t afraid a no philosophy.”
“It ain’t true.”
“Say what?”
“You talking about something that don’t exist.”
I shake my head at my friend. “Not only is they lines, but you know good as I do where them lines be drawn.”
Aibileen shakes her head. “I used to believe in em. I don’t anymore. They in our heads. People like Miss Hilly is always trying to make us believe they there. But they ain’t.”
“I know they there cause you get punished for crossing em,” I say. “Least I do.”
“Lot a folks think if you talk back to you husband, you crossed the line. And that justifies punishment. You believe in that line?”
I scowl down at the table. “You know I ain’t studying no line like that.”
“Cause that line ain’t there. Except in Leroy’s head. Lines between black and white ain’t there neither. Some folks just made those up, long time ago. And that go for the white trash and the so-ciety ladies too.”
Thinking about Miss Celia coming out with that fire poker when she could’ve hid behind the door, I don’t know. I get a twinge. I want her to understand how it is with Miss Hilly. But how do you tell a fool like her?
“So you saying they ain’t no line between the help and the boss either?”
Aibileen shakes her head. “They’s just positions, like on a checkerboard. Who work for who don’t mean nothing.”
“So I ain’t crossing no line if I tell Miss Celia the truth, that she ain’t good enough for Hilly?” I pick my cup up. I’m trying hard to get this, but my cut’s thumping against my brain. “But wait, if I tell her Miss Hilly’s out a her league . . . then ain’t I saying they is a line?”
Aibileen laughs. She pats my hand. “All I’m saying is, kindness don’t have no boundaries.”
“Hmph.” I put the ice to my head again. “Well, maybe I’ll try to tell her. Before she goes to the Benefit and makes a big pink fool a herself.”
“You going this year?” Aibileen asks.
“If Miss Hilly gone be in the same room as Miss Celia telling her lies about me, I want a be there. Plus Sugar wants to make a little money for Christmas. Be good for her to start learning party serving.”
“I be there too,” says Aibileen. “Miss Leefolt done asked me three months ago would I do a lady-finger cake for the auction.”
“That old bland thing again? Why them white folks like the lady-fingers so much? I can make a dozen cakes taste better ’n that.”
“They think it be real European.” Aibileen shakes her head. “I feel bad for Miss Skeeter. I know she don’t want a go, but Miss Hilly tell her if she don’t, she lose her officer job.”
I drink down the rest of Aibileen’s good coffee, watch the sun sink. The air turns cooler through the window.
“I guess I got to go,” I say, even though I’d rather spend the rest of my life right here in Aibileen’s cozy little kitchen, having her explain the world to me. That’s what I love about Aibileen, she can take the most complicated things in life and wrap them up so small and simple, they’ll fit right in your pocket.
“You and the kids want a come stay with me?”
“No.” I untack the bandage, slip it back in my pocket. “I want him to see me,” I say, staring down at my empty coffee cup. “See what he done to his wife.”
“Call me on the phone if he gets rough. You hear me?”
“I don’t need no phone. You’ll hear him screaming for mercy all the way over here.”
THE THERMOMETER by Miss Celia’s kitchen window sinks down from seventy-nine to sixty to fifty-five in less than an hour. At last, a cold front’s moving in, bringing cool air from Canada or Chicago or somewhere. I’m picking the lady peas for stones, thinking about how we’re breathing the same air those Chicago people breathed two days ago. Wondering if, for no good reason I started thinking about Sears and Roebuck or Shake ’n Bake, would it be because some Illinoian had thought it two days ago. It gets my mind off my troubles for about five seconds.
It took me a few days, but I finally came up with a plan. It’s not a good